County Passes Bigger Budget

September 21, 2001|By Kathy Bushouse Staff Writer

WEST PALM BEACH — A $2.65 billion budget that features money for more sheriff's deputies, new voter education programs and a lower tax rate for county residents was unanimously approved Thursday night by the County Commission.

The commission passed the budget with little discussion, except some warning that the county must carefully watch its spending in the coming year, as Palm Beach County faces the possibility of lower-than-usual money from sales tax and hotel room taxes.

Tourism officials are predicting a slowdown in visitors in the wake of last week's attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and on the Pentagon in Virginia. The county's hotels already had thousands of cancellations in the past week.

"I have a feeling we're not going to get the sales tax revenues that we're used to," said Commissioner Mary McCarty, who said the county will "need every penny" for the uncertain economic times ahead.

The county had already shifted money into reserves before the attack, increasing its emergency fund by $20.3 million to a total of $243 million.

Most of the budget battles already happened in the months before Thursday's final budget hearing. The commission had several budget workshops over the summer, where departments such as the Palm Beach Sheriff's Office made their money requests for the year.

The county was helped this year by a $17 million windfall from higher-than-expected property values, realized in July. That "extra" money allowed the commission to approve a slight tax rate cut for its residents.

The tax rate, set at $4.55 for every $1,000 of taxable value, is 5 cents lower than the $4.60 rate the commission had vowed to keep until 2002.

This year, the owner of a $125,000 home will pay $455 in county taxes, after a $25,000 homestead exemption, if the home's assessed value is not changed.

The unexpected cash also allowed commissioners to give Sheriff Ed Bieluch an extra $4.7 million to hire 45 deputies, 20 of whom are to be stationed west of Boca Raton. The commission granted Bieluch that money in July.

The commission also gave money to programs that help prevent school truancy and assist senior citizens involved in court proceedings, as well as boosting budgets of other social service agencies.

The budget does not include $14 million the commissioners agreed to pay for new touch-screen voting machines. The county is banking on money made from auctioning off the old punch-card machines to help pay for the new system that will be in place for the September 2002 primary elections. Exactly how much taxpayer money will be spent on the new system won't be known until after the auctions.

However, the budget does give Supervisor of Elections Theresa LePore roughly $2 million more to buy 600 new laptop computers for polling places, pay for state-mandated poll worker training, and pay for voter outreach programs to teach people how to use the new voting system.

Kathy Bushouse can be reached at kbushouse@sun-sentinel.com or 561-243-6641.